Baltimore fans give officials a standing ovation

Posted by Michael David Smith on September 27, 2012, 7:48 PM EDT

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The real refs are back, and the fans are showing their appreciation.

When referee Gene Steratore and his crew walked out on the field about an hour before the Browns and Ravens kick off tonight in Baltimore, the fans in the stands gave the officials a standing ovation. The officials tipped their caps and waved to the fans in appreciation of the rare case of the fans showing love to the officials.

Steratore and his crew are the first officials to take the field since the NFL ended its lockout of the officials late on Wednesday night. Although officials are rarely popular with fans, the regular officials became popular as the outcry over the replacements’ mistakes reached a crescendo with Monday night’s debacle in Seattle.

So for now, the officials are popular with NFL fans. This won’t last long.

So the head referee tonight is the guy who robbed the Lions of a game winning TD in 2010 when Calvin Johnson let go of the ball long after catching it, causing Gene Steratore to rule it “incomplete”? Perfect!

Morons, I’d never cheer the normal idiot refs or the replacement idiot refs. Can’t wait to hear tonight however how suddenly every bad call “evens out in the end” or how you can’t complain about the calls since it’s part of the game. Lets see how tough the media is on the regular union guys — wonder if there is going to be a difference?

Ladies and Gentleman….wearing number 114…..please stand as we present……..the master of the rulebook….the king of the calls….the man who defined enforcement of maintaining possession of the ball all the way to the ground…..we proudly present….the one….the only….Gene….STER-A-TOREEEEEEE!!!!!!!!

At least these real refs know the damn rule book and if it aint a foul will leave the flag in their pockets unlike the scab refs who threw the flag on so many phantom penalties it got sickening,they will be a great improvement.

Whiny, soft, butthurt crybabies who make excuses for not playing winning football aren’t going to change because a different set of individuals where the stripes. The Ravens have shown their true colors and lack of class and professionalism all season long. That is WHO they are, plain and simple, hope they get stomped tonight just to see what “new” direction the purple pansy excuse train takes.

raiders are only averaging 4.7 penalties thus far this year with the replacements refs…..just saying….there were no bogus pass interference, or illegal contact pass 5 yards on third and 20 plays, and no offensive holding calls on first and 10, when raiders are moving downfield… or a late flag thrown on 3rd down completions play….just saying there were no made up calls

the biggest problem with the replacement refs was they messed up the flow of the game and it just seemed the games were out of order and took 4 hours. As well, with replacement refs you KNOW they were unsure of the actual rules and coaches and players took advantage of this. Not going to be prefect ever.but much better.

they have already screwed up and no one has noticed. josh cribbs play where he gets hurt. ravens intercepted the ball. browns challenge and lose. by the last 5 minutes in the half, browns still have all of their timeouts left.

I’m usually anti-union until this started but was on the side of the refs here for the reason of the miminal dollar impact on the NFL.

But i agree with johnnyjagfan in that being PT and a defined benefit pension is ridicious and plus if they sit the ref for doing a bad job THEY STILL GET PAID!!…total union moves that killed manufacturing and the auto industry. Come work in the real world at a job like most of us where it’s emplyment at will….you don’t perform, you’re gone!!

I think it’s ridiculous when people make comments about the refs making too much for part-time, etc. The NFL, like many businesses, is relative to itself and not good for other comparisons (except other big businesses). The NFL is a bloated industry, worth 50 billion dollars, why? Because of us, the fans…we pay for this, the money is there, so they can easily pay for the refs, it’s not like it’s breaking anyone’s bank. It’s just like hollywood, why do actors/actresses make millions per film? Because we enable it. I’m not complaining, I’m just realistic. We can’t compare it to the everyday person because we aren’t in the NFL, ref or player. We can’t sit and bitch about how much someone makes for a movie when we;re paying $$ to watch it, buy it, and so on. In the NFL, Players that aren’t even necessarily on the field the whole game make minimum of $355k. If the players get benched they still get paid. After their contract runs out, if they don’t perform, they’re also gone. Obviously the replacement refs couldn’t hack it, so they’re gone…and they are paying (although a high amount to us) a deserved amount to the refs, obviously they are an integral part of the game, and still making less than the average player.

They might make the wrong call from time to time. But we all know theyre the best at what they do. And as someone who’s unpired baseball for 11 years I know in the least popular guy on the field. And I accept that. So welcome back boys at least you wont change the outcome of a mnf game